


To be Fearful of the Night

by Drag0nst0rm



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Dark, Gen, Hopeful Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:34:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27034267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/pseuds/Drag0nst0rm
Summary: In the chaos of Doriath, no one notices that they have to kill Dior twice.It's something of a family tradition.
Relationships: Maedhros | Maitmo & Maglor | Makalaurë & Elrond Peredhel & Elros Tar-Minyatur
Comments: 40
Kudos: 153
Collections: Innumerable Stars 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PeachBitch (peachBitch1)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachBitch1/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy!

Thuringwethil and her sisters did not tell their stories because under the rule of Morgoth, that was not the sort of thing one did. To share your story was to share where you were weakest, and you could never, ever, afford to be weak.

If Thuringwethil had shared her story - if she had told Luthien exactly how she had come to be what she was now -

Well. Perhaps Luthien would not have been quite so quick to wear her blood drenched cloak as a disguise.

(When Elwing tells her sons the story, in the twilight minutes she manages to snatch away from her duties as queen, she tells them of Luthien putting the cloak on. She never quite gets around to mentioning Luthien taking it off.)

(Later, Elrond will think that might be significant.)

(It isn’t. Not quite. Luthien _did_ take it off.)

(But by then it was too late.)

Dior is utterly ordinary, or at least no stranger than anyone expected from the son of a half-maiar and a mortal, and they are not wrong to think so.

He eats and breathes, and his heart beats true, and he is no paler than his parents.

(In the chaos of Doriath, no one notices that they have to kill him twice.)

(It is much harder the second time.)

The story as Luthien tells it is -

Well, she tells no one but Beren, in the end, and Beren doesn’t care what new power sings through her now sluggish blood, or that he is now not the only one to go hunting through the woods.

But there is a reason that, Silmaril or no Silmaril, she will not risk lingering long in Doriath.

Maedhros hears the rumors, but does not heed them. He is too used to hearing similar whispers about himself, and whatever dark power Luthien may or may not have had, he sees no evidence of it in Elwing.

(It was a seagull she turned into, wasn’t it? It was Ulmo who bore her away?)

There is no evidence of it at all in the children they find hiding in a bedchamber, and so Maedhros puts all thoughts of rumors away.

(Maglor does not because Maglor never puts thought of stories away, but the rumors that had once seemed darkly funny to him - the Valar's blessed hero cast down, as much a monster as the rest of them - now he will not humor. There is nothing of horror in the children that they have not put there themselves.)

(He knows what monsters look like. They do not look like this.)

Elrond and Elros remember the stories, more or less, but there were so many nights that their mother could not snatch even a few minutes to see them before night fell, and they are very young.

The stories fade in time.

Amon Ereb is safe, for a given a value of safe, which is as good as anywhere gets now, even the Isle of Balar. The safety of its walls does not extend far, but usually they can at least count on the woods immediately around the hill being safe enough to hunt.

They are not expecting it when the raid comes.

The twins are among the hunters, a treat they can only be afforded because Maglor can be spared to ride with them. They are armed for the hunt and skilled with their weapons for children of their age. There is not a warrior on the hunt who hesitates to throw themselves between the children and danger.

It is still not enough.

The children fall.

(It is hard to say how long they lie there. In battle, it is hard to keep track of time.)

(Their blood cools. Their blood slows.)

(There is nothing but thirst in their thoughts the first moments after they rise.)

Maglor’s voice carves into the music of the world, turning his rage and grief into a weapon that brings forth blood from the enemy’s ears. His sword is lightning in his hands, but he is still not quick enough to reach them before they fall, and nothing, nothing will ever be enough not now -

He is the last man standing, and there is a burning pain in his leg, but it doesn’t matter now.

He is strong enough for this. He is strong enough to kill them all for this.

Then the pale shapes he was running for shift, and the whole world trembles as he stumbles to a halt.

(They do not remember the stories. They do not understand what has happened.)

(The song of the trees is more distant now in the music of the world, but the song of the blood is so much clearer than ever before. It is easy now to dance with it, to move so much faster than they ever knew they could, to know exactly where and when to strike.)

(Swords are good, but biting’s better, even if orc blood does taste thick and foul upon their tongues.)

He is strong enough to stand until the last enemy falls, and then his leg at last betrays him, and he falls to his knees.

He sees the children, the unnatural speed with which they move and the black blood staining their mouths, and he does not allow himself to think in horror of what the enemy has somehow done.

They are his, still, even as Maedhros is his, still.

(Maedhros insists that Angband gave him nothing but scars.)

(Maedhros does not see the bloody light that enters his eyes when the moon is full and high, and he never remembers it after.)

(Maglor sings to him those nights, soothes him when he can, and hides the scratches that furrow deep into his arms when he can’t. But when battle comes those nights, all he can do is let him go and thank the Valar for this small mercy: that while there may be a wolf trapped in his brother’s skin, it is still trapped there, and so they can at all at least pretend that no one knows.)

(Maglor does this, and he never does anything but nod when Maedhros says that Angband left him with nothing but scars.)

“I feel strange,” Elros announces, and he frowns down at the bloody hole in his tunic. He tries to scrub the orcish blood from his mouth, but the foul liquid just smears. “And I’m thirsty.”

He cannot imagine orcish blood is any good for them. Morgoth would not want to encourage his armies to prey upon each other, not when the blood of his enemies is there instead.

He has not missed the way Elrond’s eyes went straight to the blood still spilling from Maglor’s leg.

He could fight them, fresh. He has wrestled his brother on a hundred nights when his brother had the speed and strength of a beast. They are quicker now, stronger maybe, but his sword is still all but an extension of his arm, and he knows it like he knows his songs.

He could fight them, fresh, but he is not fresh, and the blood is still spilling out from his leg onto the rotting leaves below.

And it is one thing to wrestle his brother.

It is another to think of raising his sword in such a cause as this.

No. He could not fight them. Even fresh.

“It’s alright,” he says as Elrond draws closer. “It will be alright.”

They are thirsty, and his blood must smell far sweeter than the orcs. They are thirsty, and there is no reason now for them to pretend to anything. 

If he thought Namo would hold this as sin against them, he would fight, but this is no kinslaying, it is justice.

“Come here with your brother, Elros,” he says calmly. “It will be alright.”

Maedhros will -

He cannot think about Maedhros. Not if he is to do this.

But it will be alright. 

He closes his eyes.

He opens them again when he feels the sudden pain of Elrond putting the pressure of a bandage on his leg.

‘I can feel it,” Elrond says, and his voice is distant with wonder. “You’re right. I think it will heal fine.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: There is a brief reference to suicide in this chapter. It is a fear of it only, however, and not an actual action any of the characters take.

Elros is the only one still awake when Maedhros comes back to the infirmary room.

Maglor is sleeping off the worst of his injury, and Elrond is exhausted from his efforts to heal him, but Elros is wide awake. The night feels comfortable in a way that the day has not and -

And besides. It is just - better. To be awake and perched on the table by the head of the bed where he can see both of the sleepers.

Better to be awake while he waits for Maedhros.

(They had limped back to the fortress together. Elrond had been so caught up in Maglor’s injury and the strange new song blood sang to notice the way Maedhros’s eyes went wide when they arrived, or the way his hand had jerked, just for a moment, toward his sword.)

(Elrond hadn’t noticed the way Maglor’s eyes widened with surprise when Elrond bandaged his wound either.)

(Elrond didn’t notice, but Elros did.)

Maedhros slips in the door, and for a moment they both watch Maglor’s chest rise and fall from their place in the shadows. Elrond’s chest does not rise, but that doesn’t matter. No matter what else has changed, Elrond still tosses and turns in his sleep.

“Are you going to kill us now?” Elros asks when he can no longer bear the silence. He is quiet so that Elrond won’t wake. 

Elrond should not have to be awake for this.

Elros does not want to be awake for this. He does not want to ask this of the man who taught them the sword and taught them to ride and told them their most important job, their only job, was to protect each other and survive.

He does not want to ask. But he is not as easily distracted by the music of the world as his brother is, and he is the elder, and someone has to, so he asks.

Maedhros’s eyes close. Elros has rarely seen him in so much pain. “No,” he says, as softly as Elrond has. “No, I am not such a hypocrite as that.”

“Good,” Elros says, and he settles back more comfortably on his perch. “You can help me watch them then.”

Maedhros’s mouth twitches at this solemnly given permission. “I would be honored,” he says, entirely serious despite the almost smile. And he sits by the bed, right beside Elros’s now dangling feet, and Elros eventually lets himself slide from the table and onto the floor beside him so that his head can rest on Maedhros’s chest because maybe he is just a little bit tired after all.

(When Maedhros says he is not such a hypocrite as all that, he means that he himself is a monster too. They both understand this.)

(But Maedhros understands this to mean that he is a monster for the blood on his hands.)

(Elros understands this to mean that he had not been mistaken when he realized that while Maglor’s blood smelled sweet - not prey, never prey, but still sweet - Maedhros’s smelled of something else entirely.)

(They both assume they understand one another perfectly.)

Elros does not tell Elrond most of this, but he does tell Elrond what he thinks about Maedhros.

Elrond agrees. “His blood calls for the moon,” he says, and Elros has learned to trust Elrond’s judgment about these things.

It does not matter, particularly. It is interesting, no more.

Right up until the moon climbs high and full into the sky.

They do not sleep as much anymore, so they wander the mostly empty stone corridors instead. Most people are sleeping.

And there are not as many of them as this fortress was once built to hold.

They do not intend to stop by Maedhros’s bedroom. He sleeps ill enough without them waking him.

But they hear the sounds of a fight and smell the blood, and nothing can stop them now.

(The singing hasn’t worked tonight. Maglor isn’t sure why. He’s never sure why.)

(He keeps trying anyway, even as he tries to wrestle his brother to the floor.)

(He could chain him, he supposes. After his brother falls asleep and before he awakens as not himself. He could tie him to the bed.)

(His brother is missing a hand from when he was last chained, and Maglor always thinks, _No._ )

( _Never again._ )

They tear the attacker off Maglor. It takes both of them, even with all their new strength, and only then do they realize who it is.

“What are you doing?” Elros demands, horrified, but Maedhros just snarls.

The scent of the wolf is very strong now.

“Hold him,” Maglor says desperately, and then his voice softens, gentles, and a lullaby pours from his lips until Maedhros’s eyes drift shut and he stops struggling.

Maglor’s arms are still dripping blood.

Elrond hops up from where he’s been pinning Maedhros’s chest and goes to look at the scratches immediately. Maglor’s leg has healed, but Elrond has not yet stopped watching him, fearful at any moment that all might still turn ill and steal him away.

“So this is what he meant when he said he was a monster,” Elros says, and Maglor looks up sharply.

“No,” he says. “He doesn’t know. He can’t know, Elros. If he knows that Morgoth put something into him - if he thinks for even a moment that the Enemy has a hold on his mind - “

He doesn’t say what Maedhros will do.

Elros can guess.

He has seen enough of adults jumping out of windows.

“Has the Enemy put something in our heads?” he asks, and Maglor goes pale.

 _.“No,”_ he says. “No, you are still entirely yourselves.”

“Just monsters now.”

“Never,” Maglor says, and his voice rings with the force of an oath.

“Alright,” Elrond says soothingly. “I think your arms will be alright. You can hide it from him if you really have to.” He shoots Elros a warning look. 

Elros is not sure whether the warning is to say, _Let the subject drop,_ or to say, _If you ever hide wounds from me you will regret it._

He is alright with either.

“Now what?” he asks.

“Now,” Maglor says with a sigh, “you go back to bed, and I hope he sleeps through the night.”

“Or,” Elrond says slowly as a thought occurs to him, “or it might go better if we stayed.”

(When Maedhros wakes up, there are two small figures hugging tightly to his arms, and his brother is sitting at the edge of the bed with shadows under his eyes.)

(“Nightmares,” Maglor says.)

(He doesn’t say whose. Judging from the rawness in his throat, Maedhros suspects at least one of the victims was himself, but he can’t remember them now.)

(“I can wake them,” Maglor says, but Maedhros shakes his head. It is almost like being back in Tirion again if he closes his mind and pretends.)

(“Let them sleep,” he says, and Maglor smiles.)


End file.
